Unprepared for an Unfriendly Real World

Depression Hits Hard'

As June of our 50th reunion comes near, we have been trying to recall what things were like in 1928 and the succeeding years. Since our memories are very selective, we may remember very different things I myself see an ugly wooden building called Browne and Nichols in the center of the Yard, where most of our courses took place, It was a firetrap, I believe, but that did not worry us, and we did no complaining. In another grey wooden building on Brattle Street, we had quizzes in History I every Saturday morning, Still no complaints, but a few groans because the courses were very hard.

I see an eager group of Anniversary Scholars representing many distant parts of the U.S.A., of which we were very proud. In groups, we were invited to Dean Brown's house for tea or after dinner coffee. This was a white house on the Appian Way, that tiny street so unlike its namesake.

There was no T. V. to distract us, no nuclear arrangements to worry about and Prohibition to keep us soberly at work. (I did take a course in atomic physics that seems very out-of-date as I look back on it, but seemed exciting at the time.) The yearbooks remind its of how we looked in those days, but I am more interested in what we thought and felt like. What was our would view? Did we have one? It took 10 days to get to Europe, so we may be excused for being nationalist in outlook.

The depression hit us pretty hard and fairly soon. I am member working in the Alumnae Office for 35 cent in hour. The tuition my first year was something around $350, and by senior year it was raised to $550 or thereabouts. Shopomore year we had tutorial in a newly recorded house also on the